A Decomposition and Metric-Based Evaluation Framework for Microservices

TL;DR

This paper introduces a framework for objectively evaluating microservice architectures and proposes a business process mining-based decomposition method to assist in migrating from monolithic systems.

Contribution

It presents a novel measurement framework for microservice quality assessment and a decomposition approach leveraging business process mining.

Findings

Framework helps identify decomposition options easily

Measurement reduces subjectivity in architectural decisions

Assists in evaluating architectural erosion

Abstract

Migrating from monolithic systems into microservice is a very complex task. Companies are commonly decomposing the monolithic system manually, analyzing dependencies of the monolith and then assessing different decomposition options. The goal of our work is two-folded: 1) we provide a microservice measurement framework to objectively evaluate and compare the quality of microservices-based systems; 2) we propose a decomposition system based on business process mining. The microservice measurement framework can be applied independently from the decomposition process adopted, but is also useful to continuously evaluate the architectural evolution of a system. Results show that the decomposition framework helps companies to easily identify the different decomposition options. The measurement framework can help to decrease the subjectivity of the decision between different decomposition options and to evaluate architectural erosion in existing systems.